Drain cleaner or sewer augering machines commonly in use at present are generally comprised of a rotatably mounted storage drum containing a drain cleaning cable or so-called plumber's snake which consists of a central core wire or cable core with a helically wound armor in the form of a coil spring on the core to produce a very flexible cable or snake. The cable is fed into the drain pipe or sewer from the storage drum which is rotatably supported on a frame or chassis and rotated, as by an electric motor belt drive, to impart the necessary rotation to the cable to effect the cleaning of the drain pipe or sewer.
Heretofore, one of the problems that has existed in these types of machines has been the difficulty of disassembly of the rotary cable storage drums from the machine chassis for repair and cleaning and the need for immediate interchangeability of the drums as for the replacement thereof with one containing a different diameter cable or for permitting the addition of other lengths of cable to a cable already inserted in a pipe to be cleaned where the job demands a greater length of cable. The rotatable cable storage drums of prior drain cleaning machines generally have been provided themselves with the axle on which they rotate which then adds materially to the weight of the cumbersome drum and to the difficulty of handling the same when disassembling it from the chassis of the machine. In addition, the disconnection of such axle carrying drums from the machine chassis is itself a tedious and time consuming operation.